1.
Boyle discusses
some of the reasons for his dislike of system building in The
Excellency of Theology, BW, 8:80-83.

2.
See further Brown
1990, who notes Hume's disparagement of the “passion for hypotheses and
systems in natural philosophy” as well as d'Alembert's.

4.
Boyle Letters
1:131r; reprinted in Birch 1772, I:cxxx. Birch notes, concerning
Boyle's interest in alchemy, that he was instrumental in having “a
statute made in the fifth year of King Henry IV against the multiplying
of gold and silver” repealed. Every “article, or sentence, contained in
the said act, and every word, matter, and thing, contained in the said
branch or sentence, shall be repealed, annulled, revoked, and for ever
made void; any thing in the said act to the contrary in any wise
whatsoever notwithstanding.” (Birch 1772, I:cxxxii).

3.
For the
conceptual background to this discussion see the various essays in
Lüthy, Murdoch, and Newman 2001.

5.
See An
Historical Account of a Degradation of Gold, made by an Anti-Elixir: A
strange Chemical Narrative, BW 9:5-17; Birch 1772, IV:371-374. For
discussion of this piece see Ihde 1964 and Principe 1998. The Hunter
and Davis edition of Boyle's works is now the standard edition,
deservedly, but Birch's 1772 edition is still widely available, so I am
quoting from Hunter and Davis, but giving page references to both
editions.

6.
Until recently there has been no definitive full-scale biography of Robert Boyle, but this has now changed with the publication of Michael Hunter's Boyle: Between God and Science (Hunter 2009). In addition to giving us a highly readable, detailed account of Boyle's life, Hunter has provided an extensive bibliographical essay, discussing and assessing works relevant to Boyle's life and achievements.

7.
Michael Hunter
has pointed out the same suggestion coming from Meric Casaubon:
‘it is not improbable that divers secrets of [chemistry] came to
the knowledg of man by the Revelation of Spirits’ (Hunter 1990,
398-9), and Debus notes Pagel generalizing the point: ‘by means
of unprejudiced experiment inspired by divine revelation, the adept may
attain his end. Thus, knowledge is a divine favour, science and
research divine service, the connecting link with divinity. Grace from
above meets human aspiration for knowledge from below. Natural research
is the search for God.’ (Pagel 1935, 98f, quoted Debus 1965,
21).

8.
Such doubts were
not less common in the seventeenth century than in any other. See,
e.g., Thomas 1973, 6.4, “Scepticism,” 198-206.

15.
Maddison
1969, 274. Hunter points out that the earliest draft of Boyle's Will
mentions only “Atheists and Theists.” (Hunter 1994a, lxxxiv, n 76.
(Boyle's ‘theists’ are what we would now call Deists.)

16.
The “freshly
discovered … receptaculum chyli (receptacle of the chyle, also
known as the receptaculum commune and the receptaculum Pecqueti) made
by the confluence of the venae lactae” is now more commonly known as
the thoracic duct. The beginning of this duct is the cisterna chyli.
The first publication of the discovery was made by Jean Pecquet
(1624-74) in 1651 in his Experimenta nova anatomica, though he remarked
that he made the discovery some years earlier. In the following year
Johannes van Horn (1621-70) published the same discovery, having
apparently made it independently (Foster 1924, 49). The venae lactae
[the “milky” veins] are the vessels that carry the chyle (lymph given a
milky look from the absorption of emulsified fats) from the small
intestine to the thoracic duct. (Thanks to Andrew Cunningham for this
and other information concerning the history of medicine.)

17.
Birch 1772,
I:liv. Fell was the Dean of Christ Church who was unorthodox enough to
be “determined that even the young bloods of the House should work.”
(Mallet 1924, 2:427, quoted Cranston 1957, 70). Philosophers remember
him as the unfortunate intermediary in 1684 when the King determined
that Locke, who had behaved “undutifully to the government” should be
deprived of his Studentship, but he lives in popular memory as a result
of Tom Brown's impromptu rendering of Martial's “Non amo te, Sabidi”
(Epigrammata 1.32) as “I do not like thee Doctor Fell” (etc.).
For details see Opie and Opie 1951, 169.

18.
See further
Berman 1988. The various clerical tracts and published sermons are
often philosophically unsophisticated but are nonetheless interesting.
See, among others, Charnock 1699, Dove 1605, Edwards 1696, and Pelling
1696.

19.
This
argument, which can be found in Zeno of Citium (Nihil quod animi
quodque rationis est expers, id generare ex se potest animantem
conpotemque rationis–“Nothing lacking consciousness and
reason can produce out of itself beings with consciousness and reason,”
quoted Cicero, De nat. deor. ii 22.), is barely sketched by
Descartes, but it was developed at length later in the century by
Cudworth, Locke, Bentley and Clarke. See further MacIntosh 1997.

20.
Cuphophron is
“A zealous, but Airie-minded, Platonist and Cartesian, or
Mechanist”; Philopolis is “The pious and loyall Politician”; Hylobares
is “A young, witty, and well-moralized Materialist,” who has
earlier been converted by the design argument: “The weight of Reason
and the vehemence of Philotheus [A zealous and sincere Lover
of God and Christ, and of the whole Creation] his Zeal does
for the present bear me down into this belief whether I will or no.”
(More 1668, 28)

21.
A large
number of Boyle's MSS fragments concerning atheism are transcribed in
Boyle on Atheism (BOA).

22.
For Boyle, as
for most of his contemporaries, there are laws that are not
laws of nature, with the laws of interconnection between body and soul
providing, for him, an obvious example. This interconnection also
provides a clear example of a state which God constantly preserves:
“the very conditions of the Union of the Soul and Body; which
being setled at first by God's arbitrary institution, and
having nothing in all Nature parallel to them, the manner and Terms of
that strange Union is a Riddle to Philosophers, but must needs be
clearly known to Him, that alone did Institute it, and, (all
the while it lasts) does preserve it.” (BW, 10:188-9; Boyle 1772,
5:150. See also BW, 12:380, Boyle 1772, 6:681; BP 9:40; BP 36:46v).

23.
These are the
muscles (m. flexor digitorum superficialis and m flexor
digitorum profundus) which, with their associated tendons move the
fingers of the hand. The tendons of m. flexor digitorum
superficialis are perforated and are penetrated by the lower
tendons. Schupbach 1982 (60-64) provides evidence from a number of
sixteenth and seventeenth century texts to show the way in which these
tendons were considered “a thing notable and marueilous to behold
[which] prudent nature [hath] wrought (Banester 1578, following
Columbus 1559).” Paley's early nineteenth century Natural Theology;
or evidences of the existence and attributes of the Deity shows an
equal enthusiasm: “There is nothing, I believe, in a silk or cotton
mill, in the belts, or straps, or ropes, by which motion is
communicated from one part of the machine to another, that is more
artificial, or more evidently so, than this perforation
(quoted Schupbach 1982, 64).” Both Schupbach 1982, 15, and Cunningham
1997, 109, have an impressive 1685 drawing by G. de Lairesse showing
the intersection of the tendons. (Thanks to Andrew Cunningham for
drawing these works to my attention.)

24.
Conjectured–the edge of the page is torn away. Cf. BP 4:67 (BOA
§4.5.6, p 373) where Boyle in a column headed “Against Atheism”
lists “The Eyes of Hawkes and Fishes and the Temporary parts belonging
to the Foetus.”

25.
Now,
Cleanthes, said Philo, with an air of alacrity and triumph, mark the
consequences. First, By this method of reasoning, you renounce
all claim to infinity in any of the attributes of the Deity. For as the
cause ought only to be proportioned to the effect, and the effect, so
far as it falls under our cognisance, is not infinite; what pretensions
have we, upon your suppositions, to ascribe that attribute to the
divine Being? … Secondly, you have no reason … for
ascribing perfection to the Deity, even in his finite capacity, or for
supposing him free from every error, mistake, or incoherence, in his
undertakings (Hume, 1779, Part V).

26.
Aristotelian
principles were held to be necessarily true, though garnered from
experience. After noting that “a deductive proposition … will be
demonstrative, if it is true and assumed on the basis of the first
principles of its science (Pr An, 24a27-30),” Aristotle tells
us that “it is the business of experience to give the principles which
belong to each subject. I mean for example that astronomical experience
supplies the principles of astronomical science … . Similarly
with any other art or science (Pr An, 46a17-21).” How
these necessary truths are to be derived from experience is not
completely clear in Aristotle.

28.
“God, in
these little Creatures, oftentimes draws traces of Omniscience, too
delicate to be liable to be ascrib'd to any other Cause. …my
wonder dwells not so much on Natures Clocks (is I may so speak) as on
her Watches.” (BW 3:223, Boyle 1772, 2:22, a slightly different version
is at BP 8:139.) Berman points out (Berman 1988, 7, and 44 n 11) that
the concentration on insects is not uncommon, but it is worth noting
that many seventeenth century writers emphasized the meanness and
contemptibility of insects whereas Boyle genuinely admires the
workmanship involved. The virtuoso, he often emphasizes, is, by reason
of his expertise, in a better position than the uninformed to see the
strength of such design considerations.

29.
See, e.g., BP
7:192. Boyle sometimes notices the logical possibility that God might
have created matter “incoherent” (e.g., at BW 3:248, Birch 1772,
II:38-9), but in general he adopts the position outlined.

32.
Earlier
Descartes had remarked that the laws of nature simply were the laws of
mechanics (les regles des Mechaniques … sont les mesmes que
celles de la nature, Discourse V, AT 6:54). Leibniz thought it was
a conceptual truth that the universe was lawlike–whatever
happened was the law that governed things or, in particular,
that thing. However, as noted earlier, he too agreed that,
in practice, we should search for intelligible, that
is, corpuscular, laws.

33.
For further
discussion see Sleigh 1990, 158 ff. In the seventeenth century these
laws were generally felt to be, from a human point of view at least,
the result of arbitrary decisions by God. The view was still common in
the mid-eighteenth century when the American Samuel Johnson wrote: “We
are, at present, Spirits or Minds connected with
gross, tangible Bodies, in such a Manner, that as our Bodies,
can perceive and act nothing but by our Minds, so, on the other Hand,
our Minds perceive and act by Means of our bodily Organs. Such is the
present Law of our Nature, which I conceive to be no other than a meer
arbitrary Constitution or Establishment of Him that hath made us to be
what we are” (Johnson 1752, §3, 3).

34.
Human souls
are “imprisoned” by contrast with “the angelical Community … of
<Rational & Immortal beings> not clog'd with visible Bodys”
(BP 1:66v, BOA §3.5.20, pp 255-6). See further BW 8:33, Birch
1772, IV:19. In the apparently fragmentary “A Dialogue between the Soul
and Body” Boyle's contemporary Andrew Marvell agreed: the soul is “hung
up, as ‘twere, in chains / Of nerves, and arteries, and veins,”
but Marvell nicely allows the body a similar plaint: “O who shall me
deliver whole / From bonds of this tyrannic soul?”

35.
In an earlier
tradition time and the angels, along with the heavens and the earth,
were co-created, so that there was never a time when the angels did not
exist. See St Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, 1a 61.3 c.; 1a
66.4 c; QD de Potentia Dei, 3.18 ad 20.

36.
This is
stressed in Of the High Veneration Man's Intellect owes to God,
Peculiarly for His Wisdom and Power, BW 10:176-7, Birch 1772,
V:142.

38.
For Boyle, as
for his contemporaries, ‘stupid’ in such context meant
simply ‘insensible,’ or ‘non-sensory.’

39.
R. Descartes,
Principles of Philosophy, 3.45, AT 7A:100. For a discussion of
the way in which Descartes's counterfactual views came be taken
chronologically see Roger 1982.

40.
Boyle argues
that this is generally true for scientific explanation, not just for
explaining the beginning of the universe. Thus, he writes, “every
distinct portion of Matter, … [is in] an Innumerable company of
other Bodies … all … governed as well by … The
Vniversall fabrick of things, as by the Laws of Motion
(BW 6:275, Birch 1772, III:298). The philosophical implications of this
point are discussed by Michael Polanyi in Polanyi 1958, 328-331.
Polanyi makes the Boylean point that ”the class of things defined
by a common operational principle cannot be even approximately
specified in terms of physics and chemistry“ (329, Polanyi's
emphasis).

41.
BW 5:305,
Birch 1772, III:15. Cf. Newton: ”The matter of all things is one and
all the same, which is transmuted into countless forms by the
operations of nature.“ (Newton 1962, 341) and Huygens: ”[It is]
accepted by almost all modern philosophers that it is only the figure
and motion of the corpuscles of which all things are composed that
produces all the admirable effects we see in nature“ (Huygens to Paul
Pellisson, August 15, 1679, Huygens 1888, 8:198).

42.
‘believe a Deity’ = ‘believe in a Deity’.
Boyle's usage was standard at the time.

43.
Reading ”was,
and still is,“ for Birch's and the first edition's ”is, and still
was.“

44.
Something is
heteroclite if it is unusual or in some way anomalous. Boyle
also refers to God as a being that is ”heteroclite.“

45.
BW 10:174,
Birch 1772, V:140, reading ”not well“ for Birch's and the first
edition's ”well.“ The possibility that the laws of nature
could vary over time receives serious scientific consideration today:
see Collins 2001.

46.
Already in
1277 Stephen Tempier, Bishop of Paris, had condemned the view that God
could not move the Cosmos in a straight line (though doing so would not
change its Aristotelian ‘place’). The Aristotelian claim
that such movement would leave a vacuum was not relevant, for God can
bring about states of affairs that are ”impossible according to
nature.“ (See propositions 66 and 17 of the 219 condemned.)

47.
See further,
BW 9:409-10, Birch 1772, IV:459. ”To be convinced that there is never a
body without movement,“ Leibniz suggested, ”one need only consult the
distinguished Mr Boyle's book attacking absolute rest (Leibniz 1704,
53),“ and recently Catherine Wilson has concurred: ”For Boyle,
intestine motion is occurring always, in solids as well as liquids
(Wilson 1995, 52),“ but Boyle himself was characteristically more
cautious: ”since I consider that we are not yet sure, but that though
many of the parts of solid Bodies may not be always moveless,
yet some others of them may sometimes for a while at least, be
at perfect Rest; I shall conclude as I began, and without resolutely
denying that there can be any such thing in rerum
naturà , as absolute Rest, I shall content my self to say,
That ‘tis not either absurd to doubt whether there be or no; nor
improbable to think that there is not, since we have not found it in
those very Bodies, where with the greatest likelihood it might have
been expected.’ (BW 6:210-11, Birch 1772, I:457.]

48.
See, e.g.,
§§29 and 55 of Leibniz's fifth letter in the Clarke-Leibniz
correspondence, Clark 1738, 4:639, 4:651. For suggestions that Boyle
did reject absolute space and time see McGuire 1972, 532, and Alexander
1985, 75.

49.
Substantial
forms are useless for scientific explanations, and they have as well a
number of internal difficulties (see, e.g., BW 5:454, Birch 1772,
III:117). However, Boyle does not on this account rule out substantial
forms altogether: “when ever I shall speake indefinitely of
Substantiall forms, I would always be understood to except the
Reasonable Soule, that is said to inform the humane Body; which
Declaration I here desire may be taken notice of, once for all (BW
5:300, Birch 1772, III:12).”

50.
Strictly,
Leibniz distinguished between momentum, mv, and
mv2, that is, twice the kinetic energy. See
Discourse on Metaphysics, §17.

51.
In the
mid-nineteenth century James Joule demonstrated that, given certain
assumptions about the number, size, and random motion of molecules, if
we identify the pressure P on the wall of any vessel
containing a gas with the force per unit area exerted by the molecules
in their collisions with the container, we can then prove

PV =

Nm0v¯2

3

where N is the number of molecules in the container,
m0 is the mass of each molecule,
v¯2
is the
mean-square speed of the molecules and V is the volume of the
container. If we further assume that
v¯2
remains constant when the temperature of the gas remains constant, then
this formula expresses Boyle's law, for all the quantities on the
right-hand side of the equation are constant.

52.
Four
important discussions of the issues raised by the
Thomistic/Aristotelian account of the soul are Edwards 1979 and 1985,
Owens 1974, and Kenny 1993.

53.
More 1662,
2:121; BW 12:390, Birch 1772, VI.689 (BP 1.125 has “dare not” for
“cannot”); Locke, Essay, 2.19.1. That “the soul never thinks
without an image,” is De Anima, 431a, 15-17; St Thomas agreed:
“In the present state of life in which the soul is united to a passible
body, it is impossible for our intellect to understand anything
actually, except by turning to phantasms (Summa Theologiae
1:84.7 c).”